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I can't say I'm real thrilled about our Shelby's, Dodd's, Reid's, Boehner's, et al much less our last few presidents. I suppose "the people get the government they deserve" comes into play somewhat since "the people" are suckling "bread and circuses" as they bloat up.

Lol, well the article could've been phrased better then I wouldn't worry too much about it. Conception can be pretty easy if you time it right.

I still understand the demographers and politics worries, since "accidental" conception usually make the bulk of it, whereas "intentional" conception still requires repeated and regular activity, and Medically assisted procedures are costly and make only a very small percentage, even in advanced countries.

So even if we dismiss the economic context which is not exactly friendly. This whole sexless trend means that even those who would be ready to have a baby will simply never see one coming.

Just an update on the 4Chan article I posted... yep, it's the same situation like AT&T... some kind of DDoS attack:

Quote:

Protecting Our Customers And Our Network

The most important thing we offer? Our network. When our network is attacked, or at risk of attack in a way that could harm our customers' ability to make and receive calls, or use wireless multimedia and data services, we jump to action.

Recently, Verizon Wireless security and external experts detected attacks from an IP address associated with the 4Chan family of web sites that was disruptive to our customers and our network. To protect both, we eliminated connectivity to the IP address. At no time was 4Chan itself blocked. Ongoing network security team monitoring has now determined there is no longer an immediate threat. Connectivity to those sites is being restored later today.

Typically, these attacks involve someone sending hundreds of thousands of messages to wireless devices to round up active customer addresses for follow-up activity including hacker attacks. These "sweeps" can jam our network and deliver unwanted electronic messages that also can drain customer devices’ battery life and slow their operation.

We take being the nation's most reliable wireless network seriously. Seriously enough to protect our customers and our network from malicious attacks, even if we get dinged in the blogosphere. It's easy to complain about "blocking" when your wireless data connection is stable, fast and reliable. But try connecting to the web from your Droid or Blackberry when attacks slow - and potentially block - use of our network all together.

We monitor against attacks and potential attacks to ensure the integrity of the Verizon Wireless network. Our customers expect nothing less.

More like "abortion=baby crisis." The amount of sex that Japanese people have most likely does not influence their birthrate so much as personal decision not to have children.

These things are not merely cause-and-effect. They are indicators of the underlying problems.

While it's certainly true that couples that don't have sex don't have children, much more relevant to the story is the fact that that the types of couples that have sexless marriages are not generally the types of couples who choose to rear families. There certainly may be other types of couples that also choose to not rear families, but that would be a separate issue.

The reasons why Japan has so many of these marriages is a subject deep and wide (ie, outside the scope of this particular thread).

Tokyo (Feb 8): Japan's real estate market may be in a slump, but that's not deterring Chinese from scooping up properties.

Chinese money — that is, from Chinese living in Japan — is making its presence felt in a big way. Businessman Tsuyoshi Tsuyusaki is typical of this new breed of customer. Hailing from China, Mr Tsuyusaki arrived in Japan from Beijing in 1987 and obtained Japanese nationality in 1996, hence his Japanese name.

His mantra for all his transactions is to use cash, often involving sums of tens of millions of yen. He picks up properties cheaply, mainly at court-ordered auctions following foreclosure.

With the sounds of electric drills reverberating on a slope of a hill with snow-covered Mount Fuji in the background, Mr Tsuyusaki cannot hide his pride at the construction work in progress. Preparations to put the finishing interior touches on a six-storey building in Yamanakako village, Yamanashi Prefecture, will soon be complete. The building has a total floor space of 12,000 sq m (129,200 sq ft).

"There will be 150 rooms in total," he said. "The top floor will have eight suites, each measuring 100 sq m or more."

In 2008, Tsuyusaki picked up the property for a song: 200 million yen (US$2.2 million). He said he hates borrowing money and, for this reason seldom relies on financial institutions. "My basic stance is that I do my business with cash," he said.

Mr Tsuyusaki started buying real estate in 2001. At the time, he had expanded from a milk-delivery business to running a Chinese restaurant. He then became a marriage broker and set up an air-ticket sales business. With 10 million yen in cash, he visited fishing grounds where Chinese fishermen operated and purchased sawara mackerel and other fish that most Chinese disdain to sell to wholesalers and retailers.

Mr Tsuyusaki also operated Japanese-language schools in Tokyo and Chiba and purchased more than 10 buildings, most of them at court-ordered auctions following foreclosure on the properties.

If timing is everything, then he had clearly struck out judiciously. The real-estate market in Japan had become sluggish due to an investment boom that started around 2000 and resulted in an excessive supply of properties. The situation was exacerbated by the global financial crisis that flared in the autumn of 2008.

Actually that is an old story.......the Japanese property slump has been attracting the Chinese buyers since last year. I heard it has been going on for quite a while (which I first did in last December from my colleagues), and it wasn't just the Chinese, but Asians too.

__________________

When three puppygirls named after pastries are on top of each other, it is called Eclair a'la menthe et Biscotti aux fraises avec beaucoup de Ricotta sur le dessus.
Most of all, you have to be disciplined and you have to save, even if you hate our current financial system. Because if you don't save, then you're guaranteed to end up with nothing.

And private firms are out for profit. If they start trying to build anything on the moon, they're gonna be operating at a severe loss and will end up going bankrupt before anything gets done. You'd end up with an incomplete skyhook somewhere in Texas, which isn't good for the scenery. Not many people are going to try getting involved in a project that has more than the average risk of death when they're trying to make money. If someone really wanted to build something on the moon, the govt would have to deal with it first. They're the only ones who can back such a project financially and from the labor point of view (training and provisions). But even govt's wouldn't be able to do such a thing for another few centuries, not with the way the economy is right now.

The only people capable of building a lunar "base", IMHO, are (1) a rich country and (2) a unified group of idealists/dreamers/mavericks with a charismatic leader. #1 is that while a coalition of countries can do this, internal differences among them will mean either the project will be delayed or canceled in the end. #2 will have people working together (although with some differences), and funding might be easier to get - although people's ideals may have to be sacrificed.

Spoiler for A bit off-topic and save space:

A government - unless we are talking about a dictatorship type - will not be able conscript and send construction workers and engineers to the moon. The idea of building a base on the moon is... idealistic. Aside from childhood dreams of living on the moon, you need to have a distinct purpose aside from, say, tourism. Few can afford the price of a trip anyway. For research into, for example, genetics, having it done on a small space station, which can be isolated and/or destroyed easily in case of an industrial accident, would be better. The same goes for low-G manufacturing, although having to then ship the parts back to Earth makes it impractical and better done on an orbiting station instead.

Putting a mass driver way station on the moon to get people to the belt faster and easier is better, IMHO, but it's not as "pretty" an idea as putting a base there.

The introduction of the euro in 1999, it was claimed, would narrow the economic differences between the member countries of the monetary union. Unemployment rates would converge, as would other important macroeconomic variables, such as unit labor costs, productivity, and fiscal deficits and government debt. Ultimately, the differences in wealth, measured in terms of income per capita, would diminish as well.

After the common currency’s first decade, however, increased divergence, rather than rapid convergence, has become the norm within the euro area, and tensions can be expected to increase further.

I don't see the Euro disintegrating, but the European Union may, in bits and pieces, fall apart, esp. if the richer countries find themselves needing to prop up the ones worse off. Taking care of Greece's problem is, from earlier reports, a no-no, and Spain is already on people's radar as a future problem.

__________________

"If ignorance is bliss, then why aren't more people happy?" -- Misc.

Currently listening: Nadda
Currently reading: Procrastination for the win!
Currently playing: "Quest of D", "Border Break" and "Gundam Senjou no Kizuna".
Waiting for: "Shining Force Cross"!

The only people capable of building a lunar "base", IMHO, are (1) a rich country and (2) a unified group of idealists/dreamers/mavericks with a charismatic leader. #1 is that while a coalition of countries can do this, internal differences among them will mean either the project will be delayed or canceled in the end. #2 will have people working together (although with some differences), and funding might be easier to get - although people's ideals may have to be sacrificed.

That may be true in the future, but as things are now, nobody's even going to be able to whip out an unrealistic sum of money for this, be it a coalition of govt or a third party. People have other things in mind as well on top of that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LynnieS

After just a month...

I guess the tower was too tall to "fit in"

Quote:

Originally Posted by LynnieS

I don't see the Euro disintegrating, but the European Union may, in bits and pieces, fall apart, esp. if the richer countries find themselves needing to prop up the ones worse off. Taking care of Greece's problem is, from earlier reports, a no-no, and Spain is already on people's radar as a future problem.

If the EU falls, then so will the Euro. For one thing, the Euro is a symbol of the EU and a core part of it. Without the EU, quite a few member countries will want to revert back to their original currency. It's about time people finally see that the Euro was never a good idea to begin with. Theoretically, it was true that unemployment and exchange rates would be streamlined throughout Europe with the introduction of the Euro and unification of the economy. But the reality is that countries are still too individualistic. Each country has its own history and culture. It can never work like it does in the US. Each country in Europe has its own leader, whereas all 50 states in the US look to a single leader, that being the president. We don't have that in Europe and that is probably the biggest difference.

I would of thought that alcohol also boost the chance of pancreatic cancer... but it's really the worse kind of cancer one can get since there is no cure for it by the time someone checks on it, it's already too late.

But I highly doubt soft-drinks can cause a higher chance of that type of cancer opposed to alcohol.. does not make sense really.

Bullsh*t. One of the oldest people in the world drinks Coke, and she's well over 100 iirc. Once again, it comes down to drinking moderately as opposed to drinking all the time. Two cans a day won't do anything to you.

Bullsh*t. One of the oldest people in the world drinks Coke, and she's well over 100 iirc. Once again, it comes down to drinking moderately as opposed to drinking all the time. Two cans a day won't do anything to you.

I think it is due to the caffeine content in coke that boosts their lifespan, and not the rest of the content within the soda water. Soft drinks can damage the kidneys and pancreas when consumed in excess amounts, especially after doing sports due to rapid absorption of sugar and water-retaining ions into the bloodstream. In order for these to be broken down, the pancreas have to secrete the necessary enzymes to break them down. It will either lead to overworking the pancreas, or failure altogether.

Moderation is supposed to be the key, but anything more than a litre per day, it is abit too much. The last time I remembered a health sciences professional in the army told me that 500ml per day is the limit for Coke, though I am not exactly sure of it right now.

__________________

When three puppygirls named after pastries are on top of each other, it is called Eclair a'la menthe et Biscotti aux fraises avec beaucoup de Ricotta sur le dessus.
Most of all, you have to be disciplined and you have to save, even if you hate our current financial system. Because if you don't save, then you're guaranteed to end up with nothing.

Bullsh*t. One of the oldest people in the world drinks Coke, and she's well over 100 iirc. Once again, it comes down to drinking moderately as opposed to drinking all the time. Two cans a day won't do anything to you.

Don't kid yourself; two cans a day is a LOT in the course of a lifetime. Just think about what coke is... not really something the body is designed to be consuming, let alone on a regular basis. That it is carcinogenic doesn't surprise me one bit. The old woman you mentioned is an outlier and probably has a combination of genetic longevity and other, healthier habits than her coke one that have allowed her to live so long.

Excess soft drinks consumption is a one way trip towards pancreatic carcinomas, which have a mortality rate of almost 90%, making it one of the deadliest forms of cancer. Developments of pancreatic tumors have been linked to an increase in pancreatic secretions needed to digest and control dietary and blood sugars, which in turn necessitates cellular hypertrophy and/or hyperplasia, which in turn increases the risk for genetic mutations during mitosis, which leads all the way towards uncontrolled tumor formation.

And you can't exactly say either that person X drinks more than person Y therefore the study is incorrect. Cancers are multifactorial in nature, as such disease progression and manifestation is very, very different between individuals.

I am one of those people who are very concerned about their health. I don't drink soft drinks and I think they are disgusting. Seriously, there are much better things to drink that won't do something funny to your health or weaken your bones. Even I you pay more for a natural juice, it is better for your health and tastes great.

I am one of those people who are very concerned about their health. I don't drink soft drinks and I think they are disgusting. Seriously, there are much better things to drink that won't do something funny to your health or weaken your bones. Even I you pay more for a natural juice, it is better for your health and tastes great.

In fact, everything you drink or eat harms your health in one way or another. That is how your body builds up natural resistance. I often laugh at people who constantly obsess about nutrition, seriously, often these are the people who lack real knowledge about how food is being digested and just allow themselves to be victims of the so-called dietary and health advertisements.

Besides, "natural juice" comes from what the plant is watered/fertilised with. It isn't all natural if synthetic fertilisers like ammonium nitrate is used. Fancy a cup of ascorbic acid with a different kind of lime?

The bottomline of consumption is : Eat well, stay fit, die anyway. Eat and drink until full, but don't waste food. I am the kind who don't keep leftovers, I would eat slowly and try and finish it while it is still fresh, because there are many out there who would relish at the food if they are going to be thrown away.

__________________

When three puppygirls named after pastries are on top of each other, it is called Eclair a'la menthe et Biscotti aux fraises avec beaucoup de Ricotta sur le dessus.
Most of all, you have to be disciplined and you have to save, even if you hate our current financial system. Because if you don't save, then you're guaranteed to end up with nothing.

Long before you should worry about pancreatic cancer -- you should worry about Type 2 Diabetes. That has some extremely nasty end-stage complications.

Stressing your body with far more fructose than humans were designed for.
1) Fructose (corn syrup) is something the system isn't designed for. It can use and store it but it doesn't signal the brain that "you've had enough" like old-fashioned sucrose (sugar) does. Direct consequence: obesity.
2) Persistent overload of the pancreas with sugar or fructose. Direct consequence: Type 2 Diabetes.
End stage complications: blindness, poor healing, necrosis, amputation, gangrene, organ failure, premature death.

I love microbrew colas (made with real cane sugar) and 'mexican Coca-cola' (real cane sugar). But I have maybe one a week, usually less. The *odds* are very much against a good result with drinking a liter of flavored corn syrup a day. Corn syrup is very likely a major vector in the obesity levels in the US today since almost all major producers of manufactured "foods" use it.